http://www.inlander.com/spokane/articles.sec-31-1-commentary.html Frederick Jackson Turner’s classic 1893 essay, “The Significance of the Frontier in American History,” argued that the frontier experience euro;” the opportunity for unlimited expansion i]]> Back in college, we loved going to Sonics games — mainly to see some of that era’s epic players in person. We witnessed Jordan, Magic and Bird. The crazy part was, the Sonics started to get good]]> The 2008 Supreme Court ruling on District of Columbia v. Heller is an example of a bad case making even worse law. The D.C. law overreached — it banned ownership of guns, except those grandfathered in]]> Is there any institution less popular than Congress? It turns out, yes, there is euro;” the Internal Revenue Service. So it’s not surprising that all week, Congress has been piling on the IRS for its]]> After the Constitutional Convention concluded in September 1787, officially creating the American government, a woman asked Benjamin Franklin whether the Constitution had created “a monarchy or ]]> It’s graduation season again, so you’re bound to see mortarboards and gowns around town in the coming days. But there’s one end-of-school moment you should know more about. Jus]]> At first glance, Mora County, New Mexico, may seem to bear little similarity to Spokane. The county is one of the poorest in the nation and very conservative. It’s also in the middle of nowhere ]]> It’s nice to know that those who can afford to fly won’t have those long lines much longer. The Republicans did what they always can be counted on to do — act in an unprincipled way. And D]]> There it is, up ahead — the freeway to the future! Yes, that’s the on-ramp we’ve been looking for. Fast lane, here we come! Whoa, are those… brake lights? Looks like a bunch of old white g]]> April brings daffodils, tax pay-up day and weary Idaho legislators back from Boise, home to stay. To their credit, in the just-concluded legislative session, Idaho legislators did push through t]]> If you wait around long enough, everything comes back. All those beards you see these days on hipsters from Portland to Spokane? They’re the same thing guys were sporting back in the pioneer day]]> I had just closed the front door of my car when I looked up and caught a glimpse of the young man opening the passenger door on his pickup parked next to me. That’s when I saw the pistol in a ho]]> St. Francis of Assisi was a hippie. The one-time soldier and rich party-boy found God in nature. Then he got rid of all his stuff — even his shoes — moved to the forest, and devoted his life to servin]]> China is the world’s fastest-growing economy, but what I saw in Hong Kong recently signals a challenge for continued growth in a society that has progressed largely via a government-controlled e]]> Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease, but the trick is that it can take decades to find out. Now the evidence is in and our nation’s 40-year “War on Drugs” has proven a failu]]> Mayor Condon has decided to beef up security at City Hall. Instead of a $15-an-hour contract employee signing visitors in, we will now be “welcomed” by a uniformed police officer — a lieut]]> It’s our most ubiquitous sign of the times — that guy you see on the street every day, staring intently down into his phone. Or the two ’tween girls walking together at the mall, each stud]]> We take so many of the West’s open spaces for granted euro;” the private ranches and agricultural lands that provide invaluable resources for us all euro;” from clean air and water, wildlife habitat and c]]> I wasn’t sure what a flying staircase looks like, but that’s what the crew over at Kendall Yards said would be happening Monday morning. As you may have heard, we’re in the home stre]]> The tall and stately Norway spruce, right in the middle of the Coeur d’Alene city parking lot, posed for pictures with friends last Thursday, just before its execution the very next day. A]]>